Ideas for MVP'ing an online marketplace?
Hey everyone, I am ~1 month into starting my new social impact venture!
It's an online marketplace for unique, upcycled clothing, which is new clothing made from used or unwanted materials.
Our platform, RE.STATEMENT, is a place for sustainable small businesses and independent designers to promote and sell their creations with eco-conscious buyers who want to stand out.
We've been doing quite well when it comes to user discovery, so I wanted to see y'all's thoughts on running an MVP for it. A few of the ideas I've been playing around with have been:
- Using Shopify or woocommerce and manually adding in sellers as vendors
- Shopify/woocommerce but with an app that allows multiple vendors
- Using Sharetribe, which looks like it can make a marketplace out of anything ($$$ but also don't know anyone who has used it yet)
I'm sure there are smarter, more creative ways to go about this (ideally minimal/no code), so that's why I came to IH! What do you think? What are better ways to go about this, or even simpler ways to test that buyers will buy and sellers will sell?
In the meantime, if you're curious about the current RE.STATEMENT website, check it out and let me know what you think! https://shoprestatement.com
Use Stripe Connect for a marketplace. https://stripe.com/en-my/connect/marketplaces
Oh this is great for payments, thank you so much for this. I'm wondering what platforms you recommend for multiple designers to list their clothing in one marketplace, any ideas?
I'm a coder myself so I always prefer custom coding apps even for MVP. I do use Stripe Connect before since it does offer lots of flexibility.
In your case, I would say, try Woocommerce. There is some multi-vendor plugin on the market to help you. Check out this one as well https://wordpress.org/plugins/dokan-lite/
Hey.Le,
Recently, I ran into a lot of startups in this space. If I were you, before building MVP, I would find them and talk to them. Lots of'em have struggles in user acquisition.
Probably partnering up with the right one who's already built the product is the best opinion.
Got it, thank you! Can you clarify what kind of space these startups are in? And which side of the platform did you mean they are struggling to find users for?
Also, any startups you feel comfortable sending my way would be very helpful, I appreciate you!
No Worry!
Here in London, I went to a couple of founders' meetups. I overheard founders talking about their product, but didn't talk with them personally.
Plus, accelerators have a distinct section for " Circular economy" now.
a friend of mine founded one and raised money. I can connect you with him.
What would you describe a circular economy to be?
Yes, please connect me with him! I'm in the US, and I feel like we're a little behind the times when it comes to sustainability trends and conscious consumerism...but we're getting there!
I am working on a multi-vendor marketplace idea. ping me if you wanna learn more.
mesut@kachpara.com